Editorial: letting go of knowing

by Deborah Collins

Looking
back on homeopathy over the years, one can see tremendous changes in the
methods of practice and in the practitioners themselves. In the past, a keen
grasp of the homeopathic principles and a good knowledge of materia medica were
deemed enough to have a successful practice, and to a certain extent this is
certainly true. In the course of practice, however, homeopaths inevitably run
into many cases where they cannot help, despite dedicated study. At this point
many budding homeopaths give up their practices out of sheer frustration,
claiming that “homeopathy does not work!” Facing this frustration, however, can invite us to tread onto differents paths of practice. When confronted with such cases, we are offered the opportunity to look at the obstacles within ourselves; blockages in
our own perceptions. Rather than collecting even more symptoms, we could,
perhaps, take a step back; rather than assuming that we know what the problem
is, because we have a “diagnosis”, we could, perhaps, recognise that we know very
little, if anything at all. Openness but also curiosity seems necessary to
allow that which truly needs to be healed to reveal itself. Paradoxically, this
“letting go of knowing” usually requires a concerted effort, since our need to be in
control can easily interfere.

As we look,
eyes and mind wide-open, we can start to recognise the pattern of suffering in
the other. The well-known spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle might call it the
“pain body”: the particular form and shape of one’s personal suffering,
something we identify with and therefore unconsciously cling to. Rajan Sankaran
might call it “the other song.” As homeopaths, we recognise a similar pattern in nature, that which can lift this particular dis-ease. In learning to distinguish this pain body as
separate from the pure essence of the person concerned, we are presented with
the gift of developing this faculty of insight in ourselves. As we watch the
veils of suffering lift from our patients, we, in turn, have the possibility of
disengaging from our own personal suffering. We are no longer mere observers,
we become participants, for Homeopathy is first and foremost a ‘way’ of
working, in the same sense as one would talk about a ‘way’ of life.

The extent
to which we can be available to co-operate with our patients is largely
determined by our willingness to undertake our own healing journey. We cannot simply encourage our patients to
plunge into unknown waters, while we stand on the shore. The challenge is to live
our work, so that we can stand in the water, stretch out our arms and say “come
on in, the water’s fine.”

Letting go by diving in...a good reminder we have to get wet.Reply #1 on : Thu July 29, 2010, 03:11:57

This is compassion at its best and Homeopathy that is not integrated fully in the other and in the self is not going to cover the true "totality of symptoms"; that which is the person's suffering. Interestingly, when I make the mistake of mechanically repertorizing, expanding my pool of rubrics or remedies (basically lost in a case/floundering in the water) I get further from the core of suffering in the patient and get further from my own self...my place of being fully present for the patient - with what is being presented to me and the world: their state. This was a lovely reminder of what we need to do so as to better our practices and help heal the world of suffering. Getting our feet wet is not enough, we have to fully immerse ourselves.